I've got a tech friend who enrolled his young son in the local Montessori school. He told me once about how the lobby was full of successful people who had graduated like judges, congressmen, federal government officials and heads of non-profits. I told him that Larry Page was a graduate of that school and he was astounded.<p>A while later he met with the headmaster and asked him why Page's picture wasn't featured in the lobby? He never got a direct answer but apparently they didn't feel that merely making a lot of money was enough of an accomplishment ;<).
IMO, it is the attitude to take a leap at difficult and off-the-beaten-path projects ("MoonShots") that sets Google apart from many other large companies.<p>Are they looking to profit? Sure. Does that mean that profit is the only motive? I don't think so. It takes guts to jump into a totally different area from what a company primarily does.<p>It is probably an attitude that needs to be powered by the founders themselves. That way, Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos are appreciable too.<p>Apple has its strengths, but they don't score well when you look at it from this perspective.
Sounds like he is getting sidelined. He gets a pie in the sky job where he can do less harm to profits ... And the running of the core advertisement business is left to harder men.
Is this supposed to be a good thing? Something to be admired?<p>With over 60000 employees, only one decides what technology will receive billions of dollars. See the problem?
This why I love Google. They are leaps and bounds by orders of magnitude above other companies like twitter, facebook, snapchat, linkedin etc. in terms of revenue, value and real innovation.